


Two-legged

by Zimraphel



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Elves Invent Long Pork, Hungry Elves, Other, Teriläen's Very Bad No Good Night, but like. dwarves are not the same species, cannibalist elves, everything is Too Cold and they sort of miss the jungle and Mistakes were Made., idk what to tell u, is it kinslaying if you're not technically the same species, okay?, some people?? eat dwarves??? to COPE??, their own personal spirit of fire too but literally, they have a pseudo-magical ancestral campfire, well are they?? I mean certainly elves with questionable diets!!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-07
Updated: 2020-11-07
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:48:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27440698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zimraphel/pseuds/Zimraphel
Summary: It was not that they hadn't seen some resemblance. It was only that it was not enough to to prevent an entirely different comparison from being made.Also, they were so very hungry.(this needs a lot of work still oops)
Kudos: 3





	Two-legged

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> featuring members of a minor avarin tribe who moved without a suitable winter wardrobe or like, inventing agriculture I guess.
> 
> I'm not good at narrative; I just have this irrepressible urge to write about evish cannibalism. I'm actually recommending you to try one of my other fics uploaded here instead whoops.

(Elvish memory runs slow and deep, a bright glimmer beneath the current of living experience. Often, it helps its keepers see more of the world than one without many long years of unfading memory close the surface would see. Sometimes, especially when mixed with certain _other_ traits peculiar to the Firstborn-- well, sometimes it could perhaps cloud their judgement somewhat.

  
Or so they say, later on, to the ones with the shining eyes, who look at them at first almost the same as they looked at these ones, shivering at the sound of cold silver horns).

-

It was Teriläen's turn to tend the fire tonight, and tending the fire meant collecting branches. The night was cold and bright with stars, and the wind sang a quiet rustling song through the trees overhead while she walked. The leaves were only just beginning to turn in colour, and the occasional fat black squirrel could be seen in the trees overhead. Much like the other occupants of the forest, her people were preparing for winter, and it would be good to remember the locations of squirrel-hoards in case this one was particularly harsh. The trees had nothing much to tell tonight, even the chatty poplars only murmured; she had no particular talent for tree-speak, but _that_ she could tell. There were not many dead branches to be found today, unfortunately. The trees were not perhaps feeling particularly generous after being robbed of most of their nuts. Tinsig had not yet returned, was already late. Whatever grudges the trees held would not extend to not warning of anything casting darker shadows than branches, for they had not yet cut their wood. If anything was afoot, she would know. That at least was a reassurance. None had yet been taken on this side of the mountains, but still there had been rumours, and the danger was not wholly past even in this quiet wooded valley hidden between the feet of those grey, grim mountains where their days were already starting to stretch into years. It had not been easy, but they would persist. If the land was unfriendly that was surely only unfamiliarity, and if it seemed to withhold its bounty-- it must be because they did not yet know how to ask for it.

This meagre bundle of sticks would not do, though, certainly not if Tinsig was still wandering because he had also come up short! Their family's fire had never fully gone out since they took it with them from the great lakes in the far East near the edge of the world, long ago, and were fabled for their steadfast guardianship. Its glow was a familiar steady gold in the night, a recipient of many ancient Songs with a low crackling hum of its own. It was not weak, but it had never caused forest fires, or tried to move beyond its boundaries, and when you sat by it cares were swiftly forgotten. Others had come to borrow their fire from them often; once, even a lonely Kinn-lai had stumbled into the camp asking for light. Travel-worn and exhausted, he had still swiftly departed East with his spark. Teriläen wondered, sometimes, if the Kinn-lai thought of them as Deserters for moving West after the burning of their huts back home. If they did, the traveller had not spoken of it.

She would enjoy inspecting once more at her memory of the strangely smooth fabric he had worn, so thin it had moved in the wind, but (it seemed) without letting it through. It had been woven more tightly than anything she had seen even the Western King's men wear when they came to see her father not three seasons ago, with their suspicious glances and clothed feet; she wondered if anything she wove would ever compare. Their clothes were made mostly of woven reed and bark, and it was cold here, so much colder than back home, and even colder than the home that Grandmother had known, the great forest home known to her only from song. Tending the fire would be a good time to walk in memory, a good time to think of new ways to weave, and maybe to whisper some personal prayers to the steady flame while doing so without being heard by anyone but its spirit. She did not have much of a talent for fire-speak either, or singing in general. But it was good to imagine being heard. Already she was thinking mostly of warmth, and not of the cold branches and colder receptions.

And so it was not until her bare foot touched upon something wet and cold that she noticed the body. For a moment it seemed like she had forgotten how to speak, until she heard a terrible animal scream, and slowly recognised the voice as her own.

-

But the forest was silent, and no darker shadow moved galloping like thunder.

The caves echoed only with the sound of water, and fire did not flicker.


End file.
